History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

FIRST MISSION ORDERED. 69
for notification of their arrival. Removing his family
to Fayette, Joseph encountered further persecutions,
to which was added a fresh grief. Hiram Page was
going astray over a stone which he had found, and by
means of which he had obtained revelations at variance
with Joseph's revelations and the rules of the
new testament. It was thought best not to agitate
the subject unnecessarily, before the meeting of the
conference to be held on the 1st of September; but
the Whitmer family and Oliver Cowdery seeming
to be too greatly impressed over the things set forth
by the rival stone, it was resolved to inquire of the
Lord concerning the matter; whereupon a revelation
came to Oliver Cowdery, forbidding such practice;
and he was to say privately to Hiram Page that
Satan had deceived him, and that the things which
he had written from the stone were not of God.
Oliver was further commanded to go and preach the
gospel to the Lamanites, 23 the remnants of the house
of Joseph living in the west, 24 where he was to estab-
23 ' The Lamanites originally were a remnant of Joseph, and in the first
year of the reign of Zedekiah, King of Judah, were led in a miraculous manner
from Jerusalem to the eastern borders of the Red Sea, thence for some
time along its borders in a nearly south-east direction, after which they altered
their course nearly eastward, until they came to the great waters, where by
the command of God they built a vessel in which they were safely brought
across the great Pacifio Ocean, and landed upon the western coast of South
America. The original party included also the Nephites, their leader being
a prophet called Nephi; but soon after landing they separated, because the
Lamanites, whose leader was a wicked man called Laman, persecuted the
others. After the partition the Nephites, who had brought with them the
old testament down to the time of Jeremiah, engraved on plates of brass, in
the Egyptain language, prospered and built large cities. But the bold, bad
Lamanites, originally white, became dark and dirty, though still retaining a
national existence. They became wild, savage, and ferocious, seeking by
every means the destruction of the pi-osperous Nephites, against whom they
many times arrayed their hosts in battle; but were repulsed and driven back
to their own territories, generally with great loss to both sides. The slain,
frequently amounting to tens of thousands, were piled together in great heaps
and overspread with a thin covering of earth, which will satisfactorily account
for those ancient mounds filled with human bones, so numerous at the present
day, both in North and South America.' Pratt (Orson), Series of Pamphlets,
vi. 7-8; Pratt (P. P.), Voice of Warninq, 81-117.
24 'The attention of the little band was directed, from the very commencement
of their organization, to the policy and expediency of fixing their headquarters
in the far west, in the thinly settled and but partially explored
territories belonging to the United States, where they might squat upon or
purchase good lands at a cheap rate, and clear the primeval wilderness.